Polly and Digory Return: Part 5 - The Regency Period
by Glenstorm63
Summary: Now that news starts to filter out about the Regency of Polly and Digory and the plans for choosing royalty, those with a stake in proceedings begin to gather themselves.
1. Chapter 1

Polly and Digory Return – Part 4: The Regency Period

Chapter 1: The Marshes of the Shribble

The Marsh Harrier had been at it all day. She turned again, pinions shifting in the chill afternoon wind and settled in for another low glide over the wide reed beds and sulphide lagoons of the lower Shribble. It was silent but for the plaintive calls of a pair of snipe which should have gone south long ago. And as she approached even they went silent.

Any seeing her would have assumed she was hunting sanderling, knot or winter vole. In fact she had recently snagged a tasty vole, but her real business was something quite different.

As she surveyed the drear pools and ice rimmed reeds, and low shrubby hummocks she searched for signs of human life. She had all but given up and was considering absconding and going back to her usual hunting grounds twenty miles upstream to the West.

But she blinked and settled in stoically for another pass and turned again. This time she could spy a sparse cluster of Marshwiggle tipis nearly a mile away on the northern side. She tried to take her time and to maintain surveillance of the ground and shallow meres for the time being, but within five minutes she found herself winging towards the tipis. It was time for some conversation.

Sitting cross-legged next to most of the tipis were lone Marshwiggles, tall hats pointing up, just like the tipis, gazing over the meres, smoking his or her muddy pipe, studiously facing away from each other in their silent meditations.

One sat unmoving, watching three lines. That one wouldn't want to be distracted. Another crawled a few yards to haul in an eel pot. Nothing. Splash! It sat back down again. Mmmm, maybe. A third hauled in a fishing line from where it was. A small fish. Wriggling. The flash of scales in the afternoon light. Despatched quickly and into the basket with another. The line went in again with barely a ripple and the Wiggle sat down, determined to get more. If looks could kill. A further Wiggle emptied its pipe and hung it up. It began making patacakes, in a desultory way, as if it were depressed and couldn't think of anything better to do. Best keep away. Several tipis were passed over with no-one about, probably sleeping. Then a fifth Wiggle, further away from the others, first staring into the northern distances, and then bending its head to write in a book.

The Marsh Harrier almost bent her tail and flight vanes to veer away to the next tipi and then thought better of it, curiosity piqued. "Writing in a book?" She flew closer on silent wings from behind the tipi and hovered, looking down at close range without casting a shadow.

She thought to herself, "That Wiggle looks young, but green and dirty… and as smelly as any Wiggle I have met. Writing beautifully. And there is something about its proportions…"

But just as she was about to take a closer look, the Wiggle looked upwards from under its dreadlocked hair straight at the Harrier. Before the Harrier could utter an apology or settle on a nearby bush a few yards away, the book was snapped shut and slid away and a line was thrown into the rimy mere. The Wiggle sat staring glumly across the water as any Wiggle would be expected to do, its eel-skin gloved hands holding the rod and line, its feet covered by a dirty blanket.

The Marsh Harrier dipped its head and uttered its harsh cry and then said, "Hail cousin."

The Wiggle flicked an eye the Harrier's way but did not reply. It stared lazily ahead and a few moments later packed and lit a pipe and let out a stream of muddy smoke, which coiled lazily about its face, obscuring its features a little.

"Fensweep is my name!" called the Harrier. "I am searching the Shribble for any signs of the bothersome foreign nobles who should have come forward to Beruna months ago."

"You don't say cousin," came a low, slightly hoarse voice out of the smoke. It was a statement, not a question. "But friendly visitors normally declare themselves before looking over someone's shoulder."

Fensweep hopped down and approached the Wiggle, standing about five yards away.

"It has become a hopeless and useless search as far as I am concerned. It has been rather foisted upon me and others by the Legates of Beruna."

"Then why continue?" asked the Wiggle shortly.

"Because I live in hope and because I am a loyal subject doing my duty", she rasped.

"Hopeless and useless searches usually stay hopeless and useless in my experience. Better wait till the quarry finds you… or your eel pot."

"That might be true enough for a Wiggle", agreed Fensweep. "But the continued hunt is still… important for other reasons. For I am in the know as many in these parts are not… yet."

There was good hunting around her this day. Wiggles were not by nature inquisitive. It could wait for a response. So she turned and began to sharpen and clean her beak on a stone.

But the Wiggle asked, "So what _would _you know… that many in these parts do not… _yet_… cousin?"

It was a terse and sarcastic character, this one. So Fensweep took her time with her beak before responding.

She eyed the Wiggle balefully. "The news is that the Legates of Beruna have been joined by a pair of visitors from beyond the ends of the world, at Aslan's behest! They are going to take up the rule of Narnia as Regency and install the new rulers. What do you think of that?"

Fensweep watched the Wiggle closely. The Wiggle remained as inscrutable as ever except it puffed more rapidly on its pipe before nearly expiring in a fit of coughing. Before it had recovered, the Wiggle lurched into its tipi and flipped the flap closed. The coughing continued.

Fensweep sat for a moment, surveying the scene with her pale glaring eyes. Then, hopping closer to the tipi, she rasped out "If you happen to know the fate or whereabouts of the Princess of Terebinthia, you might like to tell her that her presence at the selection trials would be most welcome. She should know that the young bloods of Telmar and Galma have been marched out of Narnia."

With that the Marsh Harrier took off, and once it had gained some height, soaring back towards its home country, it grumbled and chittered to itself as only a bird of prey can.

"No point in speaking to those Wiggles now. They'll hold their tongues they will. And who ever heard of a real Marshwiggle coughing its guts up smoking? I knew its knees didn't reach nearly high enough into the sky!"

…

About twenty minutes later, as the sun was getting low, there was the sound of a quiet oar being plied to the water close to the isolated tipi and one of the neighbouring Wiggles gave a shorebird whistle using his hands and a husky voice said: "What was all that about? It's an ill wind as blows nobody no good., That harrier was here for business or I'm a dwarf."

A cautious head poked out, minus the steeple hat. The matted muddy tangles and red-rimmed eyes were real enough, but the cheeks below those eyes were no longer a smooth muddy khaki green. The dirty skin had been rubbed, mostly onto a sleeve, exposing a pale pink face and ruby lips.

"Well, it's a short story but I've got a lot to think about. Care for a cup of rush-wash tea?"

…


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: The Scions of Galma **

**Part 1 Solid and Florid **

_**This chapter gives a flashback to the beginning of the Golden Age whch sets the tone for later chapters in this sequence. Sorry the story is jumping about so much. Just my creative process firing in all directions. Gotta write. Gotta post.**_

Year 1 of the Golden Age

"Aslan's Mane! Of all the blasted cheek!"

Magnis, the Duke of Galma thumped the scroll down on the table of his family parlor. He was of medium height, sandy haired, solid and florid but not stolid. He was dressed in his robes of office for he was due to hold court later that morning as Duke Magister.

His seven year old eldest son, Cuthbart, who had been playing at jousting battles in the corner with his little brother Broder, using wooden toys, looked up startled and slightly guilty, hoping this morning's secret misdemeanour of slapping his little brother with the flat of his wooden sword, hard, had not come back to haunt him. But his father was even not looking at him.

His father was often in some kind of temper. Even though the air had miraculously warmed around them only a few weeks ago with the scents of a full true spring and summer and a fruitful autumn promising to follow, he was not being thankful and rejoicing like everyone else the little boy knew. Cuthbart's father was getting even grumpier.

Duke Magnis strode to the balcony window of the keep of Galma, fists clenching and looking out to the Utter East, muttering under his breath. Taking some courage and feeling dutiful, Cuthbart left his little brother who was quite happily occupied and walked over to his father and stood beside him tentatively.

They could see across the rich productive countryside round about, that sloped southeast through a haze before the townlands of Galma Port, with fine fishing and comfortable bays spread out either side. Behind, the long island rose to cool forested hills and high valleys behind which were hidden the unscalable cliffs facing the wide straits between Galma and Narnia itself. Until recently, they had been ice encrusted for nearly 9 months of the year.

Magnis turned and looked down at his eldest son and then across at his wife, Felika, who was busy reading correspondence.

"Well, it is as we guessed and more, as rumored by the talking gulls. This scroll I just recieved from Narnia tells me the Witch is now very much dead. I should rejoice! The long spell against humans and the Long Winter that has bitten our backside for a hundred years has been broken. But whilst we may thank the Emperor Over the Sea for providing the highlands behind us, which sheltered us from the worst of the Narnian Long Winter, the same cannot be said for his son. Aslan has installed a pack of children who somehow blundered into Narnia and broke the spell. Well done to them, but they have already been crowned and sit on the four fabled thrones as we speak! The eldest has been crowned High King if it please you! Peter the Magnificent of all the nerve. Can you believe it?!", he fumed.

Felika raised an eyebrow non commitally. She wasn't buying into this but he hardly noticed.

"No Father", Cuthbart said truthfully. For he knew that he would not have the slightest idea what to do if he was suddenly required to step into his father's shoes at his age and sit in his high seat. He didn't think his feet would even reach the ground. But at the same time he was thinking it might be quite delightful to be called High King and have a whole wide country at his beck and call. Of course, at this early age, he thought chiefly of ponies and wooden swords, roast dinners and custards, or of luscious fruits and nuts shipped from Terebinthia or from further off.

So he ventured a question. "Father, will the summer mean that we will now have pistache nuts and melons of our very own?"

"Eh? What are you talking about? Oh possibly. If someone plants them. But Terebinthia is their true home, and look... Oh, Lions Mane! Stay on the point!"

Duke Magnis rolled on irritably... "Now, attend! These children have filled all four thrones, when at least one should have been ours. The youngest is seven! Your age! As I told you before, Galma has been a royal duchy of Narnia since the island was settled by the Narnian Kings time out of mind, well over six hundred years ago. The Duke of Galma's sworn duty since then, has been to guard and maintain the shipping lanes in and out of Narnia and support it in wars of defence, and we are being called to do so again now the ice in the straits behind us has melted and the spell of terror broken. Politically, we are part of Narnia again, unlike Terebinthia and Archenland, who were always regarded merely as allies, even though the royal families are all intermarried."

"Yes father."

He sailed on "And thus, we are the most obvious and steadfast of its surviving royal family. And your own great grandfather, who became Duke was a second Prince of Narnia in his own right. He became Duke by marrying your great grandmother, the only royal child of Galma at the time, just a few years before Jadis invaded. Just in time! She sealed the place against sons of Adam and daughters of Eve you see. He lost all his relatives, needless to say.

"Even his mummy and daddy?"

"Yes, both his parents, and his brothers and sisters and aunties and uncles. Even the old dowager queen. Jadis killed all of them."

With a sing-song kind of voice, the princeling recited, "And she turned them all into stone," with a tone of great finality. He really was a very little boy and to him it was all a distant fantasy.

"What? No! Hasn't your tutor taught you the truth yet? The talking birds that managed to get out, before Narnia was sealed off, told your great grandparents that she never turned any sons of Adam or daughters of Eve to stone at all. They were all killed outright... down to the very last one. On the Stone Table!"

The young Galman prince had a delicious shiver of horror at this news. His mother did not look quite so taken with the idea.

"And eaten by the minnit... minotaurs and, and, and hh-hags and www-werwolves?"

"No-one knows my son. Perhaps. Anyway, that is getting us off the track... again! The point of what I am telling you is that Aslan has installed a pack of children from some other place, from another world, when it is our family who ought to be on the thrones, not some interlopers! Wouldn't you say?"

"Yy-yes father."

Duchess Felika just kept at her correspondence. It was marked as private and bore no royal seals, but it was from her brother Mardon, the Crown Prince and Regent of Terebinthia who had been rejoicing at the turn in events, and obviously thrilled that Aslan had installed children. "It bodes great joy for the world and Aslan always knows what he is about," was his summary "Even father is pleased". That was a relief. How Mardon had recieved word before Magnis he had not revealed. It was dated only two days ago and must have been flown all night. She had heard that the Skua which had delivered the message only two hours ago, had been rather surly and had demanded two plump shearwater chicks as payment, having noticed some on the southern headlands when passing through. He had been prepared to wait. Oh, the grisly price for timely news.

"Now, if they broke the spell, they must deserve _some_ reward of course. For by their own account, if it is to be believed, the elder, this... Peter, _fought Jadis in hand-to-hand sword combat and his brother_, what was it?", here he perused the scroll again, "_Edmund _oh for pity's sake _Duke of Lantern Waste _, _broke her wand before_... _Aslan arrived with creatures from her castle... he had turned back from stone into living flesh, _but no humans because there weren't any to unstone as I told you before, _and together they defeated her army. And being led by Aslan down the Great River, a few days later they were crowned at Cair Paravel to the acclaim of all the noble Talking creatures and spirits of air, stream, land and sea_.'"

The boy felt a thrill go through him.

"So father, we may go to visit them? It sounds wonderful."

"Indeed we may! This contains an invitation. In fact, a summons. This missive calls for me to renew the declaration of fealty and faith... in person. So to Narnia we shall certainly go and soon."

Felika looked up, seeming to look mildly out the door at the sky but she was clearly listening intently. Her husband had not addressed her about the matter directly as yet, but she looked a little relieved.

"Now, Narnia by all our historical records was wonderful beyond imagining before Jadis. Now it can be again. Galma has only a few Talking Gulls, Gannets... and Seals which you have met, and the odd passing merpeople. The last Royal Gryphon of Galma died when my father was a boy and Archenland had none to spare. We used to have fauns and satyrs on our ships too; reputed to be most nimble in the rigging, but they all left for Archenland to swell the numbers there in your great grandfather's time, once they knew Narnia was cut off for the foreseeable future.

"For... as I said, as Duke of Galma, it is my sworn sacred task to order Narnia's defence from the sea and now Narnia is open again, they have asked me to meet them with great urgency, as every man and his dog from Seven Isles to the Lone Islands and Calormen and beyond will be wanting to poke their noses in."

"But why father?"

"Why? Aslan's Mane! What did I just tell you foolish boy?"

"I dd-don't know father."

"Phsaw!", he yelled, giving Cuthbar a withering belicose stare and whacked him across the crown of the head, which raised tears in the boy's eyes.

Felika's eyes narrowed, and tensed, ready to step in.

"Because Narnia has been ice-bound and spell-locked for a hundred years! Think! No man, woman or child has been there for that long... until now. Four children successfully ruling and defending the most fabulous country in the world at the time of its return from the worst horror imaginable? That has to be seen to be believed", he scoffed.

"Oh".

Then, placing his hands heavily on his son's shoulders, who was still stifling his tears, he gave him a shake and looking sternly down at him, tilting his chin up and said in commanding tones...

"You and Broder are my sons. We will bide our time. There will be no shunting these four off their thrones after Aslan's full blessing. So... we cannot secure the thrones by precedent? But by the Lion we shall do so by natural succession! In time, you, yes... you, or your brother, or both, will marry at least one of the sister-Queens of Narnia. Then my grandsons will gain at least one of the thrones. I am also thinking about your uncle's daughter as a match for this so called High King in a few years if we can manage it. She is just the right age."

...

All this talk of marriage made the young princeling want to squirm away and return to playing with his little brother, or burrow into his mother's soft warm embrace, but there was something in his father's tone which kept him by his side. His father was in deadly earnest and he knew better than to rebuff him when in such a mood. There was a promise of greatness in his future there too somewhere, which he held onto to keep a grip on his emotions. He stared trembling back at his father and managed a stuttered "Yy-yes F-father, I hope I shall father."

In burying the several terrors of his father, marriage and his long term future, he clutched onto the more immediate chance to visit the astonishing land of wonders, which had captured his imagination. He hoped it would be soon.

But he also knew he had just made a promise to his father which he would have to fulfil.

...


End file.
